saskanuck

You can also make wine using crabapples or apples. We do this every year, as we have 2 huge old apple trees that produce more than anyone can reasonably use. Our apple wine is a dry white, with 12% alcohol content, and many people we know don't realize it's been made from apples unless we tell them. You can tell that it's not a grape-based wine, but it's really surprisingly good. It does not taste like a typical homemade sweet wine, but rather a white table wine. As a matter of fact, we've just finished harvesting the apples this week and will be making apple wine this weekend.

I make a nice apricot cheesecake. You rehydrate dried apricots with water and a little Grand Marnier, puree them, and add them to a standard cheesecake batter. You do get small bits of apricot throughout, so if you're not a fan of that sort of texture in a cheesecake, it may not be for you.

I am indeed a Saskatchewan Canuck! Good sleuthing there. Thanks for the welcome, everyone, and I'll have to get to posting so that I get access to everything. I am a food lover, not a chef nor do I pretend to be, but I love to cook (and eat) so this place looks just wonderful. I read cookbooks like novels, so looking at all the titles listed here is going to give me more fodder than I'll ever read, but that's a good thing, no?

I can salsa all the time. I add the cilantro, chopped roughly, stems and all, at the end before I put it into jars. You still get the cilantro taste, although it isn't as pronounced as fresh. Around here, we don't get it with the roots attached either. I like the tip about adding fresh cilantro before serving, though. I always have extra cilantro around, and now I have a new use for it!

Hi, I'm a brand new member of eGullet, but have been lurking for a while now. I'm not sure if there is an introduce yourself thread somewhere, because I couldn't find one. If someone would be so kind as to show me where, that'd be grand. Anyway, to keep on topic, I have at least 50 - 60 cookbooks at last count, not including the books written by Jeffrey Steingarten and Michael Ruhlman. I have my late mom's old handwritten cookbooks and some very old vintage cookbooks of hers that date back to the 1940's. They are more precious than gold to me.